Villain Profile: Doyle

Eric Doyle is a villain who first showed up during Heroes season 3.  He has the ability to control people like puppets.

Though not a main bad guy like Sylar or Sullivan, Doyle shows up multiple times over the last two seasons of the show.  I like that he has a creative power that isn't seen in to many other places, it's not your typical flying or super strength.  Doyle is one of the bad guys who escapes from level 5 in season 3.  He is an interesting character, actually one of my favorite bad guys on the show.

He has a thing for Claire's mom (biological mother) Meredith and is pretty vicious the first time he is encountered by Claire and both her bio mom and adoptive mom.  He takes control of all three of them and makes them play Russian roulette.  I don't even know what his end game was here.  He comes across as kind of a rapist/creepy type but then seems delighted when he thought of Meredith dying (even though he seems to be infatuated by her).  That whole situation just makes him that much more demented, that even if he has a crush on someone he still enjoys seeing them suffer.

Unfortunately for Doyle he runs across Sylar multiple times (sometimes off screen) and battles it out.  He always loses in the end but does better in their last confrontation.  Doyle attempts to reform during the course of the show, or at least claims he will reform, but then in the same episode gives Claire a smirk like he was just saying that to get help when he needed it.  In the end he ends up at the Sullivan Brothers carnival working as a puppeteer.

While at the carnival we see that he has somewhat reformed but everyone at the carnival seems willing to kill if they feel it's needed.  He is also very protective of Samuel Sullivan, even attacking Claire who had previous helped him.  This guy is actually one of the more powerful specials out there and could take on just about anyone short of Sylar and a few others.  Against regular humans he has been shown to be able to control at least three people at once and I do not know what his limit actually is. 

Many other characters in the show had their powers advance over the show and it would be interesting to see if Doyle's powers ever increase in some interesting way as well.  The last we see of him is when he is tied up by Sylar, after that his whereabouts are unknown.  I do like that Doyle made several appearances but wasn't overused.  He has interesting powers and is just the right amount of unstable.